Georgia Power plans to close Plant Kraft in 2016 as part of a statewide strategy to decommission cost-prohibitive coal and oil-fired power generation stations, the utility announced Monday.

Plant Kraft, located in Port Wentworth, includes three coal-fired units and one oil-fired generator. Georgia Power will also retire two locally based combustion turbine generators as well as both units at Plant McManus inBrunswick.

The closures will impact 150 workers in the Coastal Region, although the utility does not anticipate layoffs.

“No one will lose his or her job,” Georgia Power spokeswoman Swann Seiler said. “We will manage the workforce over the next few years through attrition, transfers and relocations.”

Georgia Power will request approval to shutter Plants Kraft and McManus as well as units in Putnam and Coweta counties from the Public Services Commission later this month. The 15 units scheduled for decommission together generate 2,061 megawatts.

Georgia Power will replace that energy through other coal plants, hydroelectricity and nuclear power. The new reactors at Plant Vogtle are schedule to begin operations in 2017.

“Every few years we redo our strategy for the future,” Seiler said. “The units we are decertifying we anticipate will be too expensive to operate.”

All the units except those at Plant Kraft will be retired in April 2015. Georgia Power plants to keep Plant Kraft online through April 2016 because of maintenance and upgrades planned for the area, Seiler said.

Pick up Tuesday's Savannah Morning News or check savannahnow.com later Monday for more on this story

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OK so thank him. If you had any idea of this type of operation and what they cost to operate you would not have made that comment. Obviously the shutdown date is to regain some of the upgrade money as payback. The cost when this plant was installed has greatly increased compared to today's prices. Even to update it with computers and better equipment is unbelievable. I'm proud Ga Power is taking steps to assure their employee's will continue to be employed and not turned into unemployed numbers!!!

Ga. Power made the statement that no one will lose their jobs. I'll bet that's a big sigh of relief from the underpaid coal mining crowd. It's great to know that even though you will die as a peasant at an early age, you will still raise a family while poor and still be employed. That's good news to those who aren't employed by Ga. Power and drive Corvettes.

I have a good idea of the operation and the costs associated, I work there. The bottom line is they are closing because it doesn't make good business since to put millions of $ for pollution controls into an old plant that the EPA mandated we do by 2015. So we (consumers) will pay for all these new scrubbers, baghouses, etc. that triple the cost of a new plant.